


Weight & Foreknowing

by R_Knight



Series: Lilting [2]
Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: 2012 Stanley Cup Playoffs, 2014 Stanley Cup Playoffs, Breaking Up & Making Up, Future Fic, M/M, Magical Realism, Non-Linear Narrative, Pining, Prophecy, Soul Bond, Urban Fantasy, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-02
Updated: 2018-11-02
Packaged: 2019-08-14 15:52:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,937
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16495685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/R_Knight/pseuds/R_Knight
Summary: Jeff met a boy. The boy said wait for it. And Jeff did.





	Weight & Foreknowing

**Author's Note:**

> Even though this is part of a series, it isn’t linked in any real way to Bearing Witness other than the fact that they take place in the same universe. I wanted to write a little thing about these guys for a while, and this universe offered me a way to explore it how I wanted. All you gotta know is that some people aren’t entirely human, people mostly try not to let humans know because its frowned upon, especially in professional sports, but there are a fair few of them in hockey. Also soulbonds are a thing. Happy to answer any questions you may have about the universe.
> 
> Enjoy!
> 
> ETA: Something was bugging me about this fic - I realized after some humming and hawing that it was the ending, so there is a new/edited ending.

_“But hope that is seen is no hope at all–  
Who hopes for what they already have?”_

-Romans 8:24 

It happened like this: Jeff got called _dad_ by one of the rookies. He laughed it off, acted the way he was supposed to, and then he changed out of his gear, and he got in his car, and he drove to his house, and then he had a panic attack for the first time since – since a long time ago, thinking about all the ways his future wasn’t what he expected. What he was _told_ it would be.

Or maybe it was this: Jeff was traded to LA. Mike said _finally_ and _I need a roommate_ , and then, later, he said _I told you. I told you we just had to wait._

Or this: Jeff was traded. Jeff was alone. His head felt like fiberglass, and his body was cold _all_ the time. He holed himself away for days, ignoring everything. He imagined, abruptly, what Mike would say if he was here. Something like _get up asshole_ , _you’ve had enough time to feel sorry for yourself, now you just gotta wait it out._ But Mike wasn’t here. So fuck the waiting.

Or perhaps it happened like this:

Jeff met a boy. The boy said _wait for it._ And Jeff did.

*

Mike made Jeff stupid. He always had done, right from the start, when they were barely teenagers and Jeff’s default setting was already not that smart, being around Mike always knocked off those extra few IQ points. Jeff was doing okay, he was stumbling through life relatively independent, relatively successful so far, and then he met Mike, and it was like everything that existed before him vanished; was no longer important. Jeff’s only worries were _where is Mike_ and _how do I get him to like me_ and _how can I make him laugh._

It didn’t last for very long that first time – they were hockey players after all, and when you weren’t around a guy very often it was easy to forget he existed. But then Jeff was drafted by the Flyers in the first round, and so was _Mike_ , and then he was right back where he started: following Mike around like an eager puppy, like one of his little cousins who would cling to your leg and eagerly tell you stories of all the made-up adventures they’d been on to try and retain your attention for as long as possible. That was what Jeff felt like, always trying to be cooler than he was, better than he was, trying to be deserving of Mike’s single-minded focus.

Not that it was necessary, because Mike had made it clear right from the start that he planned to be with Jeff _for life_. They were officially Flyers for less than an hour before Mike was texting Jeff, somehow having obtained his number, and explaining in only mostly legible texts that **this is it baby! flyers 4 life, we r gona win so many cups 2gether!!!!**

 **wow u don’t hang about do u** Jeff had texted back, already smiling goofily at his phone: another IQ point knocked off, but who needed it, really.

 **I’ll learn patience** Mike replied nonsensically, **you just gotta wait for it.**

*

Jeff hadn’t put much thought into the words Mike had used in those first texts, but later, they became a sort of mantra for them both. It took them all of a week of playing together for Mike to confess to Jeff, telling him about being a witch, and telling the future, and how their own futures were so entwined it was hard for Mike to separate them, to tell who was who and which was which. But he always told Jeff that the in between didn’t matter, that the story along the way didn’t mean anything in the end, because he’d seen their future, and their future would have the cup, and it would have them both together, and the rest of it didn’t matter. They just had to wait for it.

And Jeff, made stupid by the confession, made stupid by the possibilities of their life together, made stupid by his love for Mike, took him at his word.

*

Their time with the Flyers was equal parts difficult slogs and exhilarating highs, but Jeff couldn’t regret a single moment of it, even if he wanted to. As much as he wanted to. Remembering was painful, now. Remembering was a bitter, dirty thing. Remembering was Jeff, curled up in his empty bed, in his empty house, forgetting for the night that he had good friends and a good team and a good life, when it came down to it, because suddenly none of it seemed to matter if Mike wasn’t there with him.

In his weakest moments, he wondered if Mike had been lying all along. If Mike had known how much Jeff loved him - _Mike likes Jeff, but Jeff loves Mike_ \- it was humiliating enough in itself how easily read he was, but if it was _true_ , if all along Mike had just been placating Jeff’s inconvenient feelings, reassuring him of the fairy-tale ending they would both have in the end, like a child who didn’t know better than to doubt what he was told – that hurt more than Jeff could cope with. And that was the thought that sprung up on nights like this one, when the moon was beckoning to him through his open curtains, the gentle glow full of promises that wouldn’t be kept, and Jeff, who was human, who was a naïve idiot that had thought that Mike had all the answers in the world, that Mike’s magic could keep them together, that Mike had climbed a ladder and pinned that goddamn thing up amongst the stars just for him – he couldn’t do anything about it.

He’d tried, back in Columbus, in a humiliating effort to get the universe’s attention, to ask her why this was happening and why Mike had never mentioned it. To ask if he was right, if he could possibly be right about their ending if he hadn’t seen the snags along the way. But the candles under the moonlight never flickered out the way they did with Mike; he couldn’t shuffle the tarot cards right and ended up spilling them all over the floor; and the dart board told him nothing, mostly because he could barely hit it. The habits he’d picked up over the years didn’t help now either, leaving his curtains open for the moon didn’t offer him prophetic dreams, referring to nature as _she_ didn’t make her kinder, and gently brushing his fingers over lavender plants whenever he saw them didn’t help heal his aching, always aching body.

The most they did was make his teammates look at him strangely, a little worried. None of them had known, really, that Mike was a witch. Some might have had ideas, but ultimately with Mike gone, Jeff was just the vet with the weird superstitions that extended beyond hockey. A little OCD. A bit lonely. Sometimes gruff, but _who blamed him_ , Jeff had overheard once, _he’s been through it, hasn’t he?_ Well, sure. Maybe he had. But Mike had been through it too, hadn’t he? Hadn’t he? Or had it been easier on Mike, because Mike’s universe didn’t revolve around Jeff the same way Jeff’s did Mike? Had it been easier to forget him then, and was it easier to forget him now, back in Kenora or wherever he was these days, because the way it had happened sucked, but he was free from Jeff finally, his obsessive little shadow? They’d gotten the cup, gotten it _twice_ , and maybe Mike had thought that would be enough for Jeff to back off, that his happy ending _didn’t_ hinge on Mike’s presence, as much as Jeff wished it didn’t.

But it had, and it did still, and until Jeff got answers from Mike, from the universe, from anyone who could give them to him, he couldn’t accept that this was it, all along. That this was their ending.

*

Mike had read Jeff’s palm once, a long time ago. _Bullshit_ , he’d said, like he always did before he showed Jeff the witch things he considered mainstream, those things that could be done by humans too, mostly.

“This is bullshit,” Mike had said, but he was already reaching for Jeff’s hand, sliding the beer bottle from between his fingers. “But it’s a good way to pick up. Here, I’ll show you.”

“Uh, okay,” Jeff said, stupid, _stupid_ , caught up so quickly in the feel of Mike’s fingers on his own, rough and warm, that he didn’t even think about what a bad idea it was to let Mike peer into the very heart of him. Mike didn’t notice Jeff’s panic though, too busy pressing Jeff’s hand out flat, resting it gently in the palm of his own.

Mike stared at his hand for a moment, squinting through the dark of the bar they were holed away in. “Ah, of course,” he said, touching his fingertips to the center of Jeff’s palm, “you’re an earth type, square palm, long fingers. Means that you’re practical and level headed. And here, this line is your heart line,” he pointed out. Jeff wasn’t quite sure what he was seeing, but the prickling sensation wherever their skin touched, the feel of Mike pressed up against his side so that he could properly see his hand – it was distracting.

“Below the mid finger means selfish in love, and the curve, see there? That means you express your thoughts and emotions freely. Oh – and the head line, that’s strongly curved too, _really_ deep,” Mike was saying, tracing the lines as he spoke. Jeff held his breath, barely listening.

“So a strong imagination, _very_ creative. And look there, where they overlap? Means that you’re introverted. Short life line though, so I’d say you’re easily manipulated. You should watch out for that, Carts,” he said, pressing his index finger hard against the line in question, then drawing it up Jeff’s thumb and loosely grasping it in his hand. “Thick thumb, too. _Very_ practical with money.”

“Wait, what–” Jeff said, finally registering what Mike had been saying. “That stuff didn’t sound like me _at all_.” When he looked up, Mike was grinning.

“Told you it was bullshit,” he said, squeezing Jeff’s thumb, “It worked though.”

“Worked?” Jeff asked shakily.

“Mm, see, most of the palm reading is bullshit, but it’s a good cover for real witches to do what they need to. Like, here,” Mike let go of Jeff’s thumb and traced his finger down the side of Jeff’s palm, following the vertical line there. “The fate line is the only one that really means anything. That’s the only one that can’t be affected by our own will. So yours is, ah, yeah, pretty deep – and since it ends here,” he pointed right below the line he’d indicated as a heart line earlier, “I’d say a life strongly controlled by fate, lots of big changes, a career affected by your emotions.”

“Isn’t that what hockey _is_?” Jeff asked, trying to hide the way he was starting to respond to Mike’s continued stroking of his palm.

“Sure, sure. You know what else I can tell, though?”

“What?”

“I can tell that you have either anger problems, or a career that involves fighting,” Mike said, turning their hands around and showing where his palm was pressed against Jeff’s knuckles, scarred and a little scabbed. “I can also, if I focus, feel the heat inside, so I’d know if you had arthritis or an old break. And this–” he threaded his fingers between Jeff’s, clasping them tight. “Yours are fine, but real thick fingers usually indicate heart disease. Trimmed nails in a guy means fastidiousness. Fucked up fingerprints mean like, a builder or an athlete. Or a criminal I guess.”

Jeff looked down at their hands, still clasped. “So most of it isn’t magic?”

“Nope. I mean, I could do some magic, but it’s not really needed, since the bullshit works most of the time. Like, I can tell you how fast your heart was beating,” he said, his grin turning sly. Jeff thought about how Mike’s fingers had drifted around his palm, down to his wrist. “I could feel when your hand went clammy, too. Could hear when you started holding your breath.”

“Oh,” Jeff said. Stupid.

“Yeah, _oh_. So, there’s your lesson. I’m sure you’ll put it to good use.”

“Oh,” Jeff said again, staring at Mike. “Yeah. Uh. I’m not sure I got everything, though.” He loosened their hold, turned his hand back over in Mike’s, said: “Maybe you should show me again.”

Mike stared back at him, scrutinizing. For a second Jeff thought he’d interpreted this wrong, and that he’d fucked up their relationship forever because of a stupid crush, a stupid line, but then Mike had grinned at him.

“How about I show you back at our apartment?”

*

In the light of day, Jeff always regretted his uncharitable thoughts about Mike. Mike had told him again and again that he couldn’t see the middle parts, that their lives were so mixed up it made it difficult to read the details. Jeff knew how much Mike loved him, and it did him a disservice to pretend that that wasn’t real, while they had it, but it didn’t preclude the possibility that Mike was blinded by it or was just not as good as Jeff always thought he was, and he’d seen their cup wins and just – assumed that that was the end of their story. That they would play a little longer after that, maybe, and then their jerseys would be hoisted together, and they’d retire together, maybe get married to some women, maybe each other. Maybe adopt another dog. A kid. A hockey team.

Whatever it was, when Jeff wasn’t curled up in his bed wallowing in self-pity – something he had genuinely avoided doing for a long time, for nothing else other than the ability to say that he’d grown up a lot since Columbus – he didn’t resent Mike for making that mistake, because realistically it must have hurt him just as much, if not more than Jeff, to suddenly come crashing back to earth with the realization that they _weren’t_ meant to be together in the end. That he was wrong. That they’d both waited and waited and waited, and then had to realize finally that there was nothing left to wait for. 

*

Jeff figured that there were some non-humans on the Caps. He couldn’t tell the same way Mike could, but Mike had pointed out some things over the years, and even if he couldn’t see the ridiculous levels of physicality between them all, the way the air seemed to always heat up around Backstrom during games, or their goalie’s intense _don’t get close_ vibes, he _could_ see the way Mike fit in with them so quickly. He could see it in the ease of his body, the relaxed line of his shoulders that Jeff only ever used to see when they were with other non-humans, or in private, just the two of them. He wasn’t _jealous_. He was happy that after everything, Richie could find happiness and acceptance in another team for a little while, because who knew what would happen after this year.

It just – hurt. To watch that from afar.

*

After the first time they won the cup, Jeff and Richie had fucked in the bathroom of the third club they went to that night, made out in the other three, then gone home and fallen asleep for as many hours as they could before they were required to make a public appearance again.

After the second time, after the celebrations and the alcohol and failing to kiss each other through their giddy smiles, Mike had gone very still and then wide eyed.

“Full moon,” he’d said against Jeff’s mouth, pressing in for another kiss, helpless. “Good night for wishmaking, Carts.”

“What do you have to ask for?” Jeff had asked him, playful, not taking him seriously.

“For _this_ ,” Mike had said earnestly, solemnly, “For you. To keep you, to have this – this feeling forever.” Jeff wanted to laugh at him, laugh at the ridiculousness of it, because of course they could keep this, of course they’d have it forever, but something told him that wasn’t what Mike wanted to hear. So he’d said _Okay Richie,_ and he’d said _what do we need_ , and later, under the light of the full moon, curled up half-naked in a haphazard circle made from matches stuck in apples and half-empty beer bottles, he’d said _what do we do now,_ and Mike had smiled at him, a little wild.

And then he’d said: “Wait for it.”

*

Jeff got very good at thinking about nothing but hockey. He got very good at avoiding talking about his private life, and after a while, so did his teammates. Some of them were so young they barely knew about Jeff’s history, about how he got where he was now, and what he lost along the way. It was kind of nice to be a blank slate for them. An older player to project whatever they needed on to him, whether it was captain or friend or father figure, he was okay with it. Mostly okay with it.

He watched the Blackhawks and the Penguins and the Capitals win, got pretty close again himself, kept on watching others win, kept on playing, kept on watching, kept on and kept on and kept on, until, somewhere down the line, his body started to catch up with him. Or maybe it had been catching up with him for a while now, but he’d been ignoring it, ignoring the aches and bruises and old breaks that bothered him more often, more inevitably. Every game came with it a half dozen ice packs, a palmful of pills, tape and needles and cold baths, and all of it felt like duct tape holding up a crumbling bridge. His retirement was a looming shadow, and Jeff didn’t know how much longer he could outrun it.

How much he _wanted_ to. He’d done it, hadn’t he? Got what he wanted, what every player wanted, and he’d gotten it _twice_. What else was there to do now, but this? Maybe he would coach one day, maybe he would end up back in the NHL in some way or another, but for now he was just – tired. Tired of playing, tired of hurting. Tired of waiting for something that wasn’t happening.

So. The jersey was hoist. There was an emotional last game, and an even more emotional party, where his team cried and he cried and everyone dutifully pretended that none of it was happening.

Then Jeff went home to his empty house, and his empty bedroom, with the curtains thrown open and the lavender plants he could never keep alive on the windowsill, and he got into his empty bed, and then he slept for twelve hours.

When he woke up there was a missed call on his phone.

*

“So I heard you–”

“ _Richie_ ,” Jeff interrupted him, wanting to be angry, wanting so badly to be angry that he had only called him now, after everything, after Jeff had retired, while Jeff was _sleeping_ , so that Jeff had to be the one to call, had to chase after Richie like he always had, always ended up doing. He wanted to be, wanted desperately to cling to any anger or bitterness that could protect him from the dawning realization that the distance of time was _nothing_ , nothing against the heat settling beneath his chest now, the sting in his eyes and the rising flood of desperation like nothing he’d ever felt before. _What if Richie had been right?_

“Carts, what–” Richie said, still not getting it, but then, but then – “Oh. Oh – Jeff. Oh my god, _Jeff._ ”

“Fuck, _fuck_ Richie,” Jeff said, caught on his name, wrapped up in the syllables he hadn’t let himself say in so, so long. _Richie, Richie, Richie._ He wanted to say it like a mantra, like a child praying at the foot of a bed, like a naïve _fool_ who was told to _wait for it_ again and again, but who was burned by that promise, by his own stupidity every time, and yet –

And yet, after everything, Jeff was helpless against this: the meeting, the discovery of your other half, your bondmate, soulmate, whatever it was called, it didn’t always happen upon the first meeting. It didn’t always happen on the third, the eighth, the fiftieth. It was rare, but for some people, when they met their soulmate they weren’t yet the person who they were going to become. There were stories of people who had met as children and then again as adults, after their fourth divorce, their ninth partner, and only then did it click.

Jeff felt dizzy, flushed. “Richie,” he said again, scared and hopeful and a hundred other things he couldn’t yet process.

“ _Yeah_ , Carts,” Richie said, and his voice was gentle and warm and Jeff could imagine the smile he’d have, a little crooked. “I can book a flight now, okay? Do you want – if you want that – uh. If you want this.”

“ _Yes,_ fuck,” Jeff said, “Please Richie.”

“Okay, okay I’ll – oh my god, what do I – do I, okay. Okay, I’ll book a flight for tomorrow, send me your address, all right? And we can, we can talk. About everything. You just have to – uh–” His breath caught.

“Wait for you?” Jeff asked. His face ached from how hard he was smiling. He probably looked like an idiot.

“Yeah, Mike,” he said. “Yeah, I’ll wait.”

*

It happened like this: Jeff got called  _dad_ by one of the kids he taught hockey to. He laughed it off, ruffled the kids hair, and then he changed out of his gear, and he got into his car, and he drove to his house - and then he told Mike about it, arms curled around Mike's waist, nose pressed against his neck while Mike boiled herbs in a saucepan and muttered about distractions. An elderly lady three streets over from them had taken a liking to them both, and summarily started offering them advice and pies and rare herbs in return for Mike's ache-removal remedies. If they worked for old, retired hockey players, then they'd work for anyone. 

Or maybe it was this: Mike said  _lets get another dog._ Jeff scratched behind the ears of the cat on his lap and said, shaking his head fondly,  _how about three._

Or this: Jeff had retired. His head felt empty, and his body ached, all the time. But he followed Mike to Ontario, and he holed himself away in the little house they bought, and once he felt able to again, Mike kicked and dragged him out of bed and steered him in the direction of the local ice rink, where a youth hockey team were looking for a new coach since their last had suddenly decided that he wanted to coach the team a town over. Jeff didn't know for certain that Mike had anything to do with it, but he caught the faint smell of heather, the yellow stain of daffodil on their counter tops when he went home that evening, and he decided not to ask.

Or perhaps it happened like this:

Jeff met a boy. The boy said  _wait for it_. And Jeff did. 

**Author's Note:**

> I did some research for this fic. The palm reading stuff is a mix of things taught to me by my dad, as well as google. Thick fingers can apparently indicate heart disease. The 2014 Stanley Cup Final was indeed on a full moon - thank you fate for having my back on that idea, and heather has various medicinal purposes; daffodils mean new beginnings and vitality, among other things. 
> 
> Things that I did not research: what Mike is currently doing, and where he is. How the whole Hockey-retirement thing works. Probably other things that I should have.
> 
> I think that’s everything. Hope you enjoyed, and comments always appreciated :)


End file.
